Why not Interact with SWC Policy Makers from the Beginning? . 109

Had the researcher sought the input of SWC policy makers from an early stage, several potential problems may have arisen. First, speaking to policy makers and seeking input to modelling tools can become problematic if there is no prototype from which to work. Policy makers are likely to be unclear about what the researcher intends, and unable to picture or conceptualise what the hypothetical model could do for them.

This is particularly the case for approaches the policy maker may be unfamiliar with, such as ABM. This means that early interactions can be frustrating for the researcher, and undermine trust and legitimacy for the research with the policy maker(s). This issue can sometimes be negated by using models others have developed as examples, but this would have been difficult because the purpose of the model in this context was novel, and so heavily based on discussion, rather than forecasting. In addition, the use of a demonstration model, or a prototype, can bias the thinking of policy makers, so that potentially fruitful areas of exploration are not considered.

Second, if a researcher is successful in communicating with policy makers without a demonstration or prototype, but bends their approach entirely to the policy makers’

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Figure 6.1: Stages of model development

Concept,  purpose,  approach  of  model  

Version  1  of  model   Farmer  Interaction  Types   Interviews  with  

policy  practitioners  

Input  from  ILRI/IWMI   De  Graaff  et  al  (2008)  framework  

Input  from  SWC  policy   makers  

Background  and   policy  context  on  

SWC  

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demands, a model may reinforce the policy makers’ current practice, and any prob-lems within it. The researcher’s aim was to provide a useful tool, but at the same time improve policy makers’ practice beyond simply making their work easier, or provid-ing them with evidence for a decision. To increase the chances of providprovid-ing a tool that can improve the policy process in this way, a critique of the current policy process is necessary. This is unlikely to come directly from current policy makers. Instead, other stakeholders working with the policy makers may have different perspectives that give this critique. In this case, this was provided initially by the literature, and second by the input of ILRI/IWMI in the background understanding of the policy context of SWC in Ethiopia. More generally, this critique of the policy context, outlined in more detail below, is taken to be broadly applicable to many developing countries’ SWC policy contexts.

Third, SWC policy makers in developing countries are typically time poor, and under resourced generally. It was thus prudent to engage with them only once so as not to exhaust their interest and/or motivation for the project. Consequently, the decision was taken to set up the model using other inputs, before the crucial step of stakeholder input. This timing decision was also reinforced by practical concerns to develop a strong understanding of SWC issues before interaction with the stakeholders, so a better interpretation of their input could be made. Finally, the practicalities of cost and time for doctoral research were also important. These meant only one iteration of interaction with SWC policy makers was possible. Again, the decision was made that it would be more useful to make this one interaction further along the modelling process.

6.1.2 Using the Interview Findings

The aim of the interviews with individuals working on environmental policy was to gain a qualitative understanding of their use and evaluation of models in their work.

The findings of these interviews were then used to underpin the approach taken in the SWAP model.

As the interviews were the first stage in the modelling process (see Figure 6.1) for the SWAP model, the analysis was necessarily open and flexible. Key themes and

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commonalities were identified in the interview data, and were then used as issues on which decisions needed to be taken (or awareness kept high) for the SWAP model to be coherent in a policy context and thus useful. This approach was used alongside a more technical/academic approach to making decisions about the construction of a model, for which the ODD protocol (overview, design concepts, and details) ofGrimm et al.(2006,2010) was used as a guide.

What follows in this section is a brief recap of the findings of the interviews (presented originally in Section 3.3), and a discussion of how these were used to underpin the SWAP model.

Types and roles of models The interviews highlighted the informal and ‘usage-based’ way in which participants defined the types and roles of models (see page 37).

This is useful to know when introducing and presenting the SWAP model to potential users. The focus should be on clearly explaining how the model is used. The inten-ded users are unlikely to have Western academic backgrounds, meaning the technical language used in that forum is likely to be unhelpful. However, as was the case in the workshop (discussed in Chapter 8), users are likely to be aware of the types of mod-els researchers use in their area, and have a strong intuitive understanding of such models, meaning clarity about the type and intended use of a model is important for legitimacy.

Understanding of the policy process It was clear from the interviews (see page 40) that some participants viewed the policy process as simple, and/or linear in structure, whereas others saw a complex, and even messy political process. Those that saw a lin-ear process are potentially reproducing organisational narratives. Thus it was decided to use the understanding that the policy process in any domain is likely to be complex, with a large number of stakeholders contributing without any significant level of indi-vidual control. This concept informed the idea that the SWAP model would be more useful as a tool to aid discussion and engagement between these stakeholders, rather than to produce forecasts of future states for individual stakeholders to use as a tool to influence the policy process. In this way, the model could serve to improve the connections and quality of communication between stakeholders rather than improve

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any one individual stakeholder’s knowledge or control.

Political side of the process One participant who worked directly with elected offi-cials said that elected policy makers are very unlikely to engage with models directly (see page 43). Instead, it is individuals ‘lower down’ the policy hierarchy who are going to use and interact with models. In the context of SWC this was particularly pertinent, as it is the ‘top-down push’ nature of the policy process that has been cri-tiqued heavily (see page 114). This again fed into the general sense that the SWAP model would be most useful for policy stakeholders at the ‘bottom’ and ‘middle’ of the policy process, to communicate with each other.

Spatial scales Spatial scale relevance was identified as important (see page 44) in the use of models by policy stakeholders (i.e., the scale of the model should be commen-surate with the scale of policy making the user is working at). As is discussed in the findings from the stakeholder workshop in Chapter 8, this issue arose as a potential barrier to the use of the SWAP model. Participants primarily saw the model as being of use to farmers rather than themselves, as it represented farmers’ decisions and be-haviour. However, this issue is not a fundamental problem with the model, but rather symptomatic of the critique of the SWC policy context. Policy stakeholders need to engage with spatial scales above and below the level at which they work in order to increase their chance of having a strong and rounded understanding of the situation as a whole. It is specifically the misconceptions about processes at other levels of scale that the SWAP model seeks to help redress by improving discussion and engagement.

As such, it was important to make this point clear to workshop participants in a dip-lomatic manner. Indeed, in future work, tactics to deal with this delicate issue and potential barrier to use need to be developed further.

Evaluating models: Design characteristics The finding that policy practitioners have more trust in a model when it can be linked to other (sub)models or components of a system (see page 47) does not have any direct application to the SWAP model as a discussion, or framework exploration tool. However, this understanding was central to the decision not to proceed with using the model as a forecasting tool in its current form. As discussed below (page 125), the model’s representation of the biophysical